This was kind of a rude awakening maybe. Everybody, Spoelstra, James, Wade, Bosh, Haslem, Chalmers etc etc all seemed to be suprised that they didn't win it all easily. They all looked like they were surprised to find that they had to actually work hard.

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It was the arrogance of it all. You have to wonder if even Pat Riley was surprised or could he see the writing on the wall after the Mavs went up 3-2?

Most of the so called media experts (Skip Bayless, Chris Broussard, Tim Legler, G Anthony, M. Jackson and Scottie Pippen were equally surprised thinking this was a slam dunk after game 1 and the Mavs were just lucky to get game 2.

Not to provide Lebron with any excuses, but the media actually doomed him from game one blaming him for even the close wins. Dude was under to much pressure and you could see it in his demeanor on the floor. The series changed when he and Wade celebrated that 3 by wade in front of the Mavs bench in what game 4? or was that game 2?? Either way it fueled the Mavs to get it going.

Did the Heat choke?? Nope... lets just give the credit to the Mavs for being the better TEAM as the Pistons were vs the superstar laden Lakers of 2004 and the same media had to question their so called expert analysis then.

The Miami Herald advertising sales rep needs to give Macy's back the money that they paid for this add. And more importantly now it appears that Macys and the other company the NBA and Heat licensed to make the Miami championship T-Shirts and Caps can send that apparrel down to Anartica or the United Nations to distribute that apparel some place where it will never show up on a TV screen..............

Cuban apparently had given some thought to just what he’d do if his team won a title and a big, giant, ridirkulous championship ring may not be in the offing.
“I’ll tell you something, I might not get rings,” Cuban said. “Rings are old school. ... It’s like the Fab Five [said with a nod toward Chris Webber]. Everybody had short shorts, then they didn’t have short shorts.”

I wonder what they are saying on the Heat forums. Probably whining but I wonder who they are blaming? Players who they have? The need for a supporting cast? Coaches? Officiating?

They must be in shock. Devastated. Depressed.

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Maybe the Heatforum ites are wondering if this starts a trend where they are clearly the best team and but they lose in game six of the finals for the next two years and they want to get rid of their coach and then complain when their GM trades away Wade for AI??

“It wasn’t about our high-flying star power,” Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle said. “Come on, how often do we have to hear about the LeBron James(notes) Reality Show? When are people going to talk about the purity of the game and what these guys accomplished?”

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To hear James suggest that the world will have to return to its sad, little ordinary lives and he’ll still get to be LeBron James late Sunday night was a window into his warped, fragile psyche. It was sad, and portends to how disconnected to the world he truly is.

...

There’s nothing real about James’ world, and never has been. He’s a prisoner of a life that his sycophants and enablers and our sporting culture has created for him. He’s rich and talented and something of a tortured soul. He’s the flawed superstar for these flawed times. He’s a creation of a basketball breeding ground full of such twisted priorities and warped principles. Almost every person who’s ever had to work closely with him, who has spent significant time, who’s watched him belittle and bully people, told me they were rooting hard against him. That’s sad, and that’s something he doesn’t understand and probably never will.

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The Mavericks bus was packed with players and coaches and family, and the door opened up wide for Nowitzki. The noise and laughter and love came tumbling out for him. He climbed on, the bus peeled out of the parking lot and toward the Venetian Causeway across the green waters of Biscayne Bay, toward a long night of partying, and a longer life as a champion. And here’s how the Year of LeBron James finally ended in a balmy night in June: Dirk Nowitzki was taking his team, his trophy, his talents to South Beach.

Dett, you better hope Bron's mom doesn't see any of your webart !
*
To the BBall guys that saw Mavs as the much better team - kudos. I think their road to the finals was a little tougher/volitile. But the Heat is a power franchise now.
*Now for the luuzas that threw in with the King yet couldn 't see he was naked, perhaps you were misguided by the media hype. Heatles in less than 7, let me say this : boldBillLaimbeer, CloudWalker, Darth Tater, max, PistonFanInCavsTown, Ryder, TaShawn
dang TaS I thought you knew better

Dett, you better hope Bron's mom doesn't see any of your webart !
*
To the BBall guys that saw Mavs as the much better team - kudos. I think their road to the finals was a little tougher/volitile. But the Heat is a power franchise now.
*Now for the luuzas that threw in with the King yet couldn 't see he was naked, perhaps you were misguided by the media hype. Heatles in less than 7, let me say this : boldBillLaimbeer, CloudWalker, Darth Tater, max, PistonFanInCavsTown, Ryder, TaShawn
dang TaS I thought you knew better

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I was afraid of jinxing it for the Mavs. I never vote for what I want to have happen.

But what's most insidious about Heat Talk is how arbitrary it all is. No Finals, no grand stage and need for attention. No reality, no problem. We shouldn't clap too hard at the man brave enough to remind us that LeBron's career will go on. The Heat will be back, and look how loudly we applauded Dirk Nowitzki for overcoming those "soft" and "choker" labels that ... we saddled him with for the sake of conversation. Somehow, LeBron's entire career was reduced to the 2010 Celtics series and the 2011 NBA Finals. Those parameters made the last week possible, as much as anything idiotic or mystifying James himself did. We did it so we could talk. Times like these, I just wish sports would learn to shut up.

David Vranicar —DÜLMEN, Germany –
One of the very, very few places to watch NBA basketball in the German city of Dülmen – or any neighboring city – is a bar called Wohlfühln, owned by a pair of German guys who care too much about American basketball. Last night, they were more busy than usual.
I'm originally from the U.S. but ended but up here, in the western state of North Rhine-Westfalia, because of my girlfriend's friend's wedding. I've been burned more than once by shoddy online streams, so I figured it was best to watch the game at a bar. There weren't a lot of options, so Wohlfühln it was. (My girlfriend mercifully accepted my invitation to act as translator.)
Their basketball-watching parties are usually more like private showings, desolate gatherings comprised wholly of friends and other oddballs. But by virtue of Dirk Nowitzki's presence, Game 6 of the NBA Finals was the biggest basketball event in the history of Germany. As such, last night's game – this morning's game, really – was the closest thing basketball has ever had to mass appeal in Germany.
For one night, Wohlfühln, which is about 240 miles from Nowitzki's hometown of Würzburg, could have been mistaken for a typical American sports bar. Flat screens glowed from all corners, Mike Breen's voice wafted through the speakers. Nowitzki jerseys dotted the crowd, and guys talked lustfully about the Heat cheerleaders. It was, for Wohlfühln, pandemonium.
"I don't think a lot people really care about basketball," says the owner, a 30-something guy named Oliver. "Basketball is not very famous in Germany. But because of Dirk, people care."
Or at least it seemed that way. During a Heat run, someone shouted, "%%%% you, Miami!" When the Mavericks scored the joint erupted — even if Dirk wasn't the scorer. And at the bar a pair of St. Pauli Girl-blonds wearing Nowitzki jerseys sipped oversized German beers.
Oliver, who bounced around all night wearing a Nowitzki's Mavs jersey plus long baggy shorts and high-tops, has shown every NBA playoff game this year. There have been an average of about 10 viewers. The six-hour time difference between the U.S. and Germany doesn't help – Game 6 tipped off at 2 a.m here – but more than that is the country's longstanding disinterest in basketball, which is at best a second-tier sport, probably about as popular as handball. And just like the rest of Europe, all other sports take a backseat to soccer. But Dirk brought everyone out tonight.
"Of course this is a big deal because Nowitzki is the first German in the NBA," says a patron named Benjamin. (This at best a half-truth – Shawn Bradley and Detlef Schrempf are a few of the Germans who preceded Nowitzki, even if no one in Germany noticed.) "With Dirk in the Finals basketball is more important than it has been. We've had other sports get popular for short periods – poker, tennis. But this is even more popular because of Dirk."
Yesterday morning's Finals game revealed why Germans have been slow to embrace this sport: they keep comparing it to soccer. Accustomed to commercial-free broadcasts, every ad was met with groans, prompting one patron to say, "There is more ‘whoa' in my glass of beer than in this game," which may or may not be German sarcasm. And toward the end of the night, as Miami lobbed brick after brick at the basket, the guys at my table debated whether or not it is more difficult to make a shot in basketball or get a goal in soccer.